Reply to Drowning in stuff, finally time to tackle but how to not be overwhelmed? Anyone do this before?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]If it's a misc box of stuff you need to sort, you really don't need to sort. Glance in the box and "save" anything that seems special. Otherwise, throw-out. Whatever was in there and got thrown-out, you'll never know. And that's ok.[/quote]

Agree with this. Especially if it’s a box that has been sealed up for months or years. If you haven’t touched something in 6 months to a year, there should be a very strong presumption that it needs to go. It doesn’t matter that it’s “good.” You don’t use it and you don’t need it. The exception would be sentimental things, but you need to have a plan to save only the best things and have a plan to make them accessible.  [/quote]

Op here. I totally love this in theory. The rapid packing up plus the ADHD in the family means boxes contain things like

Savings bonds from grandparents
Only existing photos of deceased relatives
Last year's tax returns
Great great great grandfather's harmonica
A missing file of printed portfolio samples from my work that must be somewhere

Among

Half finished craft projects
CDs
Random cords
Flashlights
Unopened mail (grrrr)

DH took on a lot of the packing in a hurry, and while I appreciate that he got it done, it's....interesting to see how things ended up. The distraction between important and not important got thrown out the window in favor of "get all the stuff packed and out of the way."

But guess what, guys? I bought a label maker![/quote]

I’m the PP who said to label the boxes with everything that’s in them. I just want to say that based on my experience, these mixed boxes are going to be REALLY hard for you. I might just put them off. This is also the thing I would suggest getting help with. What will happen is that you will open a box and there will be things in there you want to keep, but you won’t have a place for them. So you’ll just stand there holding the things or you’ll be stashing them around the house randomly, which isn’t a good use of time.

I think if you’re on your own, you could do worse than just having new, empty “keep” boxes available. Put things in them if you can’t put them away in the house where they belong (because you don’t know or it’s full), and add the labels as you go. At the end you’d probably have half as many boxes, all with clear labels of everything that’s in them. It’s not the finish line, but it will be more manageable and you’ll be set up to get help from a professional organizer later because that person will be able to see what’s there.

On paper, I wouldn’t even try. Just have big banker boxes and put your keep papers in. Filing systems are for much farther down the organization line. Paper is pretty compact - box it and move on.

Finally, gently, the mixed boxes are probably not your DH’s fault. What probably happened is that your previous house wasn’t very organized and it got packed as it was. That’s okay! You don’t need to have any reasons or excuses - it’s just stuff. It doesn’t matter how it got there. [/quote]

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